Where has the time gone since I said goodbye to the Ambulance Service and the 24 years I gave them of blood, sweat and mixed emotions. I literally blinked and two years have passed in Primary Care bringing with it new challenges, new faces and new goals to achieve. For anyone entering Primary Care thinking because we work 9-5 Monday to Friday that it will be an easier life than on the road, my best advice is to stay in the emergency sector, as Primary Care is most defiantly not for you. Nevertheless, that aside as well as my work rate increasing so has my learning curve steepened, and concurrently my thirst for knowledge to aid the understanding of what patient presentations are in front of me in clinic.

No Paramedic alive enjoys the feeling associated with the blankness that enters your brain when faced with a presenting condition you do not understand or know about. Your palms sweat, your body temperature rises a few degrees and the only word that leaves your lips is ‘egrrrrrrhhhh’. This feeling keeps me awake at night bringing the thirst to research, read and absorb knowledge about that blank moment which in turn brings a good feeling to you as you continue to learn in Primary Care and the ‘egrrrrrrhhhh’ get less and less.

So what have I achieved in my first two years of working at BSOL Training Hub?

I have helped the percentage of Paramedics employed in Primary Care rise 544% in the Birmingham and Solihull region. I have a seat on a national Health Education England panel that discusses HEE RoadMap, where I advise on current grey areas and how to overcome them in Primary Care. I have worked with the local university to increase numbers of student Paramedics on Primary Care placements by 400%, not only allowing third year students the benefit but also first year too. I am a visiting lecturer at two universities helping to craft the Paramedics of tomorrow with the knowledge of my 26 years in emergency and Primary Care.

It has been an amazing two years both as Paramedic First Contact Practitioner Facilitator and as a Paramedic Lead and can honestly say it has been down to the help and support of my colleagues and peers helping me to get where I am today, thank you.

I look forward to another two years as I roll my sleeves up ready to start the next exciting project with BSOL Training Hub and say ‘I should of done this years ago’.

Jason Jeffries-Lloyd

Paramedic First Contact Practitioner Facilitator & Paramedic Lead